Haere rā - End of Story

We have been home for exactly one week. A few things still have to be unpacked, but otherwise we are just about back to normal.
Both Mattéo and Juliette have been to their respective "Kindergartens" this week. Mattéo was greeted with lots of enthusiasm, some drawings and dedications made by each of his classmates and even a gigantic "Welcome Home Mattéo" banner.
Alister had also a very pleasant return to work where he got to exchange news about his trip for the latest developments at the EPO. A number of fairly urgent (and labour intensive) meetings scheduled for Easter had been postponed in Alister's absence, which made the return a bit more easy.
Delphine had the toughest job - namely to try make the house homely again. We have now a few more Kiwi curios dotted around the house and we have a enormous amount of very happy memories.

One statistic, just for interest - we travelled 8850 kms in rented vehicles (plus a couple of hundred in Roger's car).

Alister has finally got his slides processed. They came out well, but were not very well digitally scanned by the laboratory. A selection is shown above.

We know that a few friends from New Zealand have been following this blog. We'd like to say how nice it was to have met them and how much we hope to return to that part of the world (but it won't be for quite some time): Mary and Wayne; Joanna, James and Sophie; Nick, Piper and Daisy; Lawrence, Hilary, Adam and Hannah; Tony, Barbara, Greta and Leo; Antony, Sara, Tamanna and Hayden. And thanks to our family for their hospitality/car hire/taxi services: Roger and Wendy; Sally; Ness and Anthony and of course Helen (and Gemma).

It was fun to keep this blog going - it really didn't take much time to maintain (perhaps 90 minutes each week). We have had 312 different people looking at this blog from Africa to Scandinavia, Chile to Canada, Ireland to Japan and a total of 1335 visits ... so it was worth the effort.

We will set up a new blog, with monthly postings, describing our life in Munich. The address will be -
Nous allons etablir un nouveau Blog mensuel pour vous tenir au courant de notre vie à Munich. Le lien sera -

http://alisterdelphine.blogspot.com

Home again

Friday morning - with all the bags and cases (even the fishing rods) packed, we head out to the airport for an early check in and disposal of the luggage at midday. A few breathless moments and repacking of carry on bags and we squeezed under the weight limit. The afternoon was spent on the waterfront in the sunshine, whilst Mattéo caught a further dozen small fish with his bait catcher, which he left to his great friend (and second cousin) Anthony from Paraparaumu who came down with his Mum Ness to say goodbye, as well as Roger, Sally and of course Helen!

Again Air New Zealand offered splendid service for our journey from Wellington to Auckland and on to Hong Kong. We were all fit and well and were able to enjoy a day in this city. It must be said, however that the weather was unusually grey and chilly but we spent about 6 hours on Kowloon and Hong Kong Island (including a great Dim Sum meal) before getting back to the aiport. Alister had had the bright idea of booking a room at the airport hotel for the day (special transit deal) and we all rested/slept from 1500 to 2100.

A short visit to the Duty Free shops in Hong Kong, and we were returned to the care of Lufthansa for our final leg : 13 hours to Munich direct. Again Mattéo and Juliette were absolutely adorable throughout the whole 46 hour journey from Wellington to Munich. The photo of the two of them shown below was taken just before landing at Munich.

Gordon really helped us by getting to the airport by 0530 with his VW multivan and kindly got us and all our baggage home in no time at all and even brought along a brunch "starter kit" of milk, eggs, bread, cheese etc. We were very touched and amused to see a card and a bag of Kiwi fruit with a Bavarian ribbon from some of our neighbours hanging on our front door as we arrived.

Similarly to our departure all those weeks ago, we went for a very long and great fun swim at the local Michaelibad swimming pool under a perfect blue sky (still a bit cold though 1°C). Now the confusing and daunting task of unpacking and restarting life in Germany lies before us.

There will be a final blog posting soon (when the jet lag has subsided). Anyway, we are very pleased to be home.

Our last week in New Zealand

Masterton may appear to be a fairly ordinary small country town, but it is host to a number of fairly large events. The airshow "Wings over Wairarapa", international hot air balloon meetings and the famous Golden Shears competition. This is perhaps the largest sheep shearing competition in the world, lasting three days with competitors from many of the major wool producing nations. We were lucky to get to see the action during the first day. Aside from shearing competitions, there were hectic wool "handling" contests and wool pressing races where 170 kgs of wool were powerfully and manually packed into metre high bales. Great fun!!

We also enjoyed some rides out into the countryside and Wendy looked after Mattéo and Juliette whilst Maman and Dad went to the races at Trentham (near Wellington) on a specially chartered train. Uncle Roger had organised a corporate box - we had a lot of fun and didn't lose too much money. After a pub lunch we returned to Wellington on Sunday.

The last highlight of our trip was the visit to Kapiti Island. This is only 30 mins north, and 15 minutes boat ride, from Helen's house and is perhaps New Zealand's most important nature reserve. Only about 50 people per day can visit (we booked with the Department of Conservation back in January). The island has no "introduced" mammals (our bags were searched for mice and rats!) and the birdlife there is simply extraordinary. The forest was buzzing with birdsong and movement. Alister walked up the 560metre peak and swam in the beautiful water (the coast is a marine sanctuary). Helen, Delphine, Mattéo and Juliette enjoyed the walks near the coast and had fun with the frequent visits of the Wekas (similar to Kiwi) and Kaka (very intelligent mountain parrot).

Together with Helen, we have been enjoying Wellington, its coastline, beaches, monuments and nightlife. Helen, Delphine and Alister had a great night out in Courtenay Place and Cuba Mall (cocktails in the Matterhorn).

The bags have been packed. We seem to have much more than for our arrival ... lets see how generous the airline staff in Wellington will be.

What a fantastic, unique experience we have had in this country. We could easily stay another 3 months, but all good things must come to an end and we are looking forward to getting back to business as usual in Munich.

Poverty Bay and Hawke's Bay

Our last week of campervan life saw us travelling around Poverty Bay from "surf city" Gisborne to Art Deco city Napier at the southern end of Hawke's Bay.
We realised that the coast along these bays was not really suitable for many of the water sports that we hoped to do and we followed the suggestion of fellow campers from the East Cape and, after a relaxing dip in the thermal baths in a jungle setting in Morere, we headed into the Te Urewera National Park and spent a couple of days at Lake Whaikeremoana. We found a delightful spot by the lake and all four of us tried our hand at trout fishing. We later learnt that the warm water of the lake had driven the fish to a depth of about 60 metres. Alister enjoyed some solo kayak with fabulous scenery, Mattéo and Juliette joined in for some exploration on a Canadian canoe.
We drove down around the coast of Hawke Bay, visiting some savage beaches and negotiating tight gorges in our 6.6 metre 3.6 tonnes van on the way. The town of Napier was as lovely as we had expected and after weeks of wild nature, we were treated to a couple of days of elegant culture in this Art Deco city. Th destruction of the city in 1931 by earthquake and fire gave rise to a completely nenovated cityscape in the style of that time - Art Deco. Aside from visiting the city centre, we took time for lazy holiday activities at the national aquarium, the dolphines, seals and penguins at Marineland and a lovely afternoon at the swimming baths.
Visiting Hastings, and its surroundings on the way, we made our way down to Masterton where Delphine, Mattéo and Juliette were dropped off at Uncle Roger's house whilst Alister dashd down to Wellington to return our trusty old camper van.
We've already had a lot of fun in Masterton, but this will feature in the next blog .....

The Eastern Cape

Before heading out towards the East Cape we decided to spend a couple of days in New Zealand's sunniest town Whakatane. We found a decent spot to "camp", fish and barbecue on Ohope Beach. Delphine took an early Sunday morning boat ride to find some dolphins. Look at Delphine's dolphin photos to assess her success! Meanwhile, Alister, Mattéo & Juliette caught a nice big Yellow Tail (fish) for lunch.
The East Cape is one of New Zealand's best kept secrets - very often missed by passing tourists opting for the short cut from Opotiki to Gisborne. It is a mixture of the wilderness of the South Island's West Coast and the beauty of the Coromandel Peninsula. Lots of impressive bays along the north coast (great snorkelling - Alister spent a few minutes alone with a huge long-tailed stingray) and breathtaking mountain scenery inland. The hills as well as the coastline are covered with lovely Pohutukawa trees - some giants were 400 years old.
We climbed 800 steps up to the lighthouse on the East Cape, which is about as far east as you can get (it is very near to the International Date Line).
Our journey down the east coast found us in the heart of friendly Maori-land, visiting their lovely buildings, churches and Maraes. More surfing in beautiful locations and more successful fishing on Tolaga Bay's 700 metre long wharf (a very beautiful - and tasty - Gurnard).
Now we have reached Gisborne - important Maori town (Kiri Te Kanawa's home), Captain Cook's first landing point and more surf beaches!